


Too ready

by Raspberyl



Category: Skullgirls
Genre: F/M, Gen, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-20
Updated: 2015-07-20
Packaged: 2018-04-10 05:12:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4378556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raspberyl/pseuds/Raspberyl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, one can be more ready to deliver a baby than the mother herself. Beowulf/Cerebella.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Too ready

“Woman in labor, woman in labor!” Annie shouted to the top of her lungs.

Those words were enough to make several people in wheelchairs and crutches move out of the way, while doctors and nurses approached what at first seemed to be a floating woman until they noticed a little girl was carrying her in her arms.

“Oh, oh my!” Said one of the nurses, quickly leading her to an empty wheelchair nearby. “Please, let us take care of her! Are you okay!?”

“Calm down, I'm fine.” She said, yet still helped Cerebella sit on the chair for her own comfort. “I’m pretty strong.”

“You sure are!” She replied in that irritating, patronizing tone ‘grown ups’ tended to take with her. “How long has your mommy been in labor, darling?”

Annie snorted, yet didn’t get to deny the fact as Bella blurted out right away: “’You kidding me!?” She panted, holding onto her belly and nearly doubling over in pain before speaking again: “You know how old I would have to be to have a kid _that_ old!?”

“M-My, I didn’t mean to… I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, she’s not my mom.” Annie explained more calmly to the flustered nurse. “She’s um, well I’m… the baby’s auntie, I guess…?”

“Godmother.”

“Godmother?”

Annie blinked, surprised and Cerebella gave her a pained smile.

“Yeah, Beowulf asked and I thought it was a good idea. Or is it too much trouble to–?”

“No.” She interrupted so fast and loudly that she felt her own cheeks get a little hot in embarrassment. “No, not at all. It’s no trouble at all! I, actually… it makes me a little happy. It’s an honor.”

Cerebella smiled warmly. “Good. Ceo’s gonna be in good hands if something happens to us.”

“Alright ladies.” Clapping his hands, a doctor nearby took hold of Cerebella's wheelchair. “I think that’s enough talking. Unless you plan on having your baby in the waiting room, we must take you somewhere more private. Is there a father?”

“Oh, right. Uh, yeah there is, he should be here in a few minutes. He had a, uh, problem.”

“I hope he’s alright—He didn't sound so good over the phone…” Grumbled the acrobat, then doubled over again in pain, victim of another contraction. “Owwww!” 

“You only have to worry about yourself, alright? I’ll make sure that idiot is by your side on time.”

“Thanks—Ow—Geez—Doctor why does my baby hate me this much…!? Owww—!”

“Please breathe and remain calm. We'll give you some drugs that should help with the pain, so don't you worry, miss; just breathe deeply."

"Screw breathing—Can't you just give me the drugs already...!?"

Annie snickered, yet didn’t have much time to relax, because as soon as she lost sight of her suffering friend, her ears caught the voice of another one approaching:

"Beeellaaa..."

For this friend, however, she didn’t feel sympathy for, but rather contempt.

“Beowulf!”

He let out a noise that was meant to be a howl, yet came out as a weak whine. He was sweaty and awfully pale, and could barely stand on his own two feet, relying on Adam to walk forward while he clutched his abdomen.

“Beeellaaaa..." He repeated agonizingly. In two long strides, Annie was in front of him, and she grabbed his collar in anger. "Ow! Hey!”

“Where-were-you!?” She shouted, shaking him with every word.

“Easy, easy!” He put his hands over hers, and Adam, who was struggling with the wrestler’s weight as it was, groaned when she refused to let go.

“Please—Please, listen to him—I really do think there’s something wrong with him!”

“Well, get it together! You can’t get sick when your child is being born!”

“Ceo is being born!?” He hollered so loudly that he made everyone in a 10 meter radius cover their ears. 

“NO! Not—Not yet, but soon she will be and you need to be there when it happens! I’m not having my goddaughter be born without her dad by her mother’s side!”

“... Goddaughter? You accepted?” He said, his pain forgotten only for a moment as he smiled happily.

“O... Of course I did.” She replied, scratching the back of her head sheepishly. “Though I’m not sure you guys want a godmother who can’t even grow up and be a mother herself…”

“’You kiddin’? If something happens to us, you’re the only person in the world I’d trust Ceo with. You’re perfect for the job: I know you’ve been like both a lil’ sister and mother to me, at least, so I'm sure you'd have no problem taking care of her.”

“Beowulf…”

“Hey, you two.” Adam let out a tired huff, his knees bending slightly. “I really, really don’t want to ruin this moment you’re having, but not even in military training they make us carry this much weight _and_ your wife is still in labor.”

“Oh, sorry!”

Quickly taking a hold of his arm, Annie helped Beowulf sit down on a bench nearby, and as soon as Adam let go of him, he bent over his stomach again, pale as a sheet of paper.

“Ow—Dammit! I don’t... have.... time for this!” He growled, punching his own belly in frustration. “Bella’s waiting for me…!”

“Stop that! You’re just gonna make yourself feel worse.” The other man said, quickly grabbing Beowulf’s arm. Annie put her hand on his forehead, instead.

“No fever, just pain...? What is this, anyway? You were fine a couple of hours ago...”

“Is something the matter?”

That voice, she didn’t recognize—Both men, however, flinched when they heard it as if trained to fear its owner. Annie turned around to find a tall woman with odd, red eyes looking at them with the menacing look a cat gave to its unsuspecting prey.

“Aw. Is our Hero feeling a little under the weather?” The woman said playfully and Beowulf nearly snarled, then pointed straight at her nose.

“Valentine! ’The hell are YOU doing here!?” 

“I’m a nurse. This is a hospital. What do _you_ think I’m doing here?”

“Do you two know this woman?” Annie asked and Adam, who looked just as troubled as the wrestler, nodded slowly. 

“Yes, she’s… she’s a nurse…”

“I can see that.”

“But she’s not… a regular nurse.”

“She’s a _devil nurse.”_ Whispered Beowulf and the girl raised an eyebrow.

“What the he… ck is that supposed to mean? Why are you two acting so weird?”

“Why, hello.” Said Valentine, her focus shifting to the girl. Her eyes scanned her up and down before extending her hand: “Annie of the stars, is that right? My name is Valentine... otherwise known as the devil nurse, I suppose.”

“You can just call me Annie.” She shook her hand, and the shadow of a smile appeared on the woman’s mask. “Hey, do you think you could help us out? Beowulf started having these random pains and he really needs to get better because his wife is in labor and he needs to be by her side ASAP.”

“Annie, don’t…!”

“Quiet!” She said firmly, and Beowulf shrunk like a scolded puppy. “You want to be with Cerebella, right? Then we need all the help we can get, because she's feeling terrible and the last thing she needs by her side is someone who feels worse!" After making sure the man didn't have any more objections, she looked at Valentine again. "Do you think you can help us out with this?”

"Well, I'm no doctor, but... I'm sure I know more than one, anyway." She tapped her own chest confidently. "What are the symptoms?"

"His stomach hurts a lot. He's also sweating a bunch, but I'm sure that's just because he's in pain."

"I feel like I'm gonna throw up any second now, too." He added, closing his eyes, then taking a deep, long breath.

"All those are rather vague—It could be anything, really. Nothing else? What about how this all started?"

"Uh, it started not too long ago..."

"Did you eat anything out of the ordinary today?"

"Nah, same as always."

Valentine tilted her head. "And it started out of nowhere?"

"Yeah... After Feng came to tell me Bella was headed to the hospital, I was in the taxi and suddenly I started feeling really, really bad."

"... So it started around the time you heard your wife was in labor?"

"Uh, yeah. I guess."

“Couvade.”

“Huh? No, Beowulf.” He said, pointing at himself.

“No, you fool, I mean that what you’re going through is the Couvade Syndrome.” After looking at their clueless faces for a moment to see if anyone recognized the name, the nurse sighed tiredly. “It’s a group of symptoms the non-pregnant parent of a child can experience. The cause of this syndrome is still unknown, but most believe it’s psychological—Seeing the mother go through the physical hardship of pregnancy can make her partner start feeling the same as her, even when it’s impossible for them to be pregnant. This symptom in particular—sharp abdominal pain—is often known as sympathy pains by the common folk.”

“Oh...” The three of them said in unison.

Beowulf, however, then whispered to Annie:

“I didn’t understand a word she said.” 

The girl sighed tiredly, and rubbed her temple.

“It means you’re so worried about Cerebella, your body is imitating the pain of labor as a way to sympathize with her, Beowulf.”

“Oh.” He said more surely. He mulled over the idea for a moment, before speaking up again, eyes wide: “Wait, what!? So I’m in like, fake labor!?”

“Something like that.” Replied Valentine amusedly. “Don’t look so surprised—It’s more common than you would think.”

“But I don’t have the time to have a fake baby! My wife is having a _real baby_ right now and I gotta be there! Owww...!”

“Calm down.” While Annie rubbed his back to try and get him to relax, Adam looked at Valentine, frowning.

“And what are we supposed to do about this if it's psychological? Convince him that he’s not the one who’s pregnant…?” She shook her head.

“No. While the pain is caused by psychological factors, it's still real—Beowulf isn’t just imagining it. That being the case..." The woman searched her pockets for a moment, taking out a syringe full of clear liquid. "A shot of this anti-inflammatory should do the trick.”

“Whoa, whoa, you ain’t gettin’ any needles near me!"

“Beowulf, Bella is waiting for you! C’mon!" But the man hid behind Annie, using her as a very small shield against what he thought was a deadly blade.

"Nuh-uh, no way!"

"It's just an injection..." Said Adam, unable to hide an amused smile, and Beowulf glared at him.

"HEY! Needles hurt, okay!?"

"Well, there's always pills, but they won't be as fast as an injection... Not to mention that option is not as fun for me." The man made a face at her and she chuckled. "I guess your baby can come to this world with both of her parents crying."

"Tch..." The wrestler looked to the side in anger, and Annie nudged him.

"Oh, c'mon! You can fight the skullgirl with nothing but a chair and a dead arm but can't take a little needle!? You gotta do this—For Cerebella _and_ Ceolwynne! Stop being such a coward!"

"I'M NOT A COWARD!" He yelled immediately, and rising up, Annie stole the needle from Valentine's hand.

"THEN PROVE IT!"

"FINE!"

There was a pause, where both friends glared at each other daringly and the patients around them quietly whispered at each other.

"... Alright then." Valentine finally said, and took her syringe back from Annie's hands with a wicked smile. "We need to find a room where we can do this, though."

"Why? You're just gonna inject his arm, aren't you?"

"Not quite. When you want the anti-inflammatory to act quickly you must inject the gluteus"

"The what?" Beowulf looked at the other two, asking for translation, and Adam gave him a troubled little smile.

"... She means your buttocks."

"... _WHAT!?_ " He shouted so loudly that, once again, half the patients in the waiting room had to cover their ears. "LIKE HELL I'M LETTING THIS DEVIL NURSE GET ANYWHERE NEAR MY ASS!"

"Well, enjoy your fake baby delivery~" Valentine said in a singsong voice, and Annie took Beowulf's face in her hands to make him look at her in the eye.

"You gotta do this for them."

"But..."

" _Beowulf_."

He made a sound of desperation, until finally, he sighed in defeat.

"Fine... fine, let's just... let's get this over with..."

"Oh. Then please, do follow me."

She gestured towards a hallway nearby, and just as Beowulf slowly walked past her while holding onto his stomach, she whispered:

"I'm going to enjoy this."

He gulped, and clenched his teeth.

_Gotta do it for them... gotta do it for them..._

—————————————————————————————

"Hey, big guy... you made it."

"Yeah... yeah, I'm here. Sorry it took me so long."

When he made it to the room Cerebella was in, the pain that had him unable to move more than a couple of steps was nothing but a memory—though he still felt some mild discomfort in his stomach. She smiled weakly at him, drenched in sweat and her cheeks warmed up when he placed his hand on her forehead.

"'You doin' okay?"

"Yeah... I was in a lot of pain before, but they gave me some drugs and now it's like Ceo never tried to kill me." She joked, then looked at his face and frowned. "You don't look so good, though."

"Uh, yeah, I... was having a bit of a hard time myself."

"Oh?" Cerebella tilted her head. "Don't tell me you got so nervous because you're gonna be a father that you got sick over it?"

"No, not... not exactly." He said, scratching the back of his head. "I actually got sick because I was _too ready_ , I guess. So ready that I was planning on delivering a baby myself, kinda." She snorted, looking at him like he had grown another head.

"What are you _talking about_? Are you on something?"

"Kinda, uh... I'll explain it to you later. Or Annie will—I think she understood it better than me."

"... Oookay, then." She shrugged, too used to her husband's weirdness to question him any further. "It's comforting to know, though."

"What is?"

"That you're so ready for this. Because let me tell you, I'm really nervous and I'm not sure I'd be able to handle it if it weren't for you being so sure this is going to turn out fine."

"Of course it's gonna be fine. We're gonna be as great at parenting as we are at kicking ass!"

Beowulf kissed her cheek and Cerebella giggled, letting her head fall on his chest, finding comfort in the way it rose and fell gently.

"Just as a heads up—We gotta buy a thank you present for Valentine."

"V-Valentine...?"

"Yup. Kapowski, too; I think I kinda destroyed his back."

Cerebella pulled apart from him to give him a confused look.

" _What were you doing all this time?"_

"Excuse me, I think we're ready to begin." Interrupted the doctor, who had been sitting near her feet all the while. "You must start pushing."

"Uh... okay!" Cerebella readied herself, but before she started, she looked at Beowulf one last time. "You've got a lot of explaining to do."

He smiled nervously, and the doctor sitting between Cerebella's legs gave him a look of amusement, that he replied by sticking out his tongue childishly.

Doctors and nurses, they were all evil, he decided.


End file.
